IMF raises its forecast for world growth this year but says economies will slow in 2027

BANGKOK -- The International Monetary Fund on Tuesday slightly upgraded its outlook for the world economy for this year, but it's still forecasting growth at a sluggish 3.1%. The IMF had forecast global growth at 3.0% in July. The world economy expanded at a 3.5% annual pace in 2025.The IMF Economic Outlook predicts that growth in the United States will remain steady at 2.3% in 2026 and 2027. It said it now expects oil prices to be up nearly 41% this year, at an average of $96 a barrel, boosting global inflation to 4.7% in 2026 from 4.1% last year.The update released Tuesday, as world economic and financial leaders gather in Bangkok for the fall meetings of the IMF and World Bank, says the boom in artificial intelligence is offsetting damage from sharply higher prices for oil and gas. But the benefits of the AI boom are not shared equally: the U.S. and China account for more than three-quarters of net demand for imports of computer chips and other AI-related equipment, it said. “The outlook is highly uneven,” Silvana Tenreyro, the IMF's director of research, told reporters in Bangkok.Growth is increasingly concentrated, with 32 countries accounting for 95% of global growth, the rep...